"It is worth noting that this immigration system is not an original component of US governance. Whereas the first government under the US constitution formed in 1789, there were no federal immigration laws until the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and even this law was limited in the sense that it banned a specific class of immigrants. The US did not have closed borders until the Immigration Act of 1924, which established national origins quotas across the board.
The primary justifications for these early immigration laws were xenophobia, eugenics, and overt racism. By the 1990s, however, multinational corporations understood that closed borders – especially combined with free trade agreements freeing multinational companies to shop around for “cheap” workers, while at the same time constraining the options of workers to move around and look for better jobs – were a powerful weapon in their arsenal to squeeze ever more profit out of global supply chains. While cleverly hidden behind discourses of “security” and “sovereignty,” our immigration system is actually a scam rigged to guarantee an upward flow of wealth at the cost of human rights.
The North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) illustrates this dynamic. Signed in 1992, Nafta created a free trade zone among Mexico, Canada and the US, specifically making it easier for goods, capital and corporations to move freely while conspicuously ignoring the movement of workers."
Daniel Mendiola @ The Guardian
So much that I don't get about the present (or past, for that matter) but one piece relevant here: aren't a lot of industries, agriculture and construction, to name only two of the bigger concerns, major beneficiaries of the cheap labor this immigration system allows but at the same time big supporters of Trump, who radically threatens this cheap labor source? I suppose we might assume, like a lot of his supporters, they thought Trump was only talking about deporting the criminals amongst these immigrants but he was always bragging in his campaign about deporting 10-20 million undocumented immigrants. I'm pretty sure there aren't 10-20 million immigrant gang members in the US, nor 10-20 million undocumented poor immigrants, without cutting into significant numbers of those harvesting food for our tables, building our homes, and mowing our lawns. I just heard the other day that as much as 40% of the agricultural work force in the central valley of California is made up of undocumented immigrants. Why would those businesses support Trump? Why anybody, I know, but still you expect businesses to watch closely their bottom lines, if nothing else.
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